Masterplan
by Generation Extant
Summary: My version of the 11th Doctor comes to an end in a climactic final confrontation with an old foe, with Russell and Colleen caught in the crossfire like never before. (This story was originally published from August 4-25, 2010 at Generation Extant dot com.)


The face on the projection was no longer the metal, emotionless facade of a Dalek, but the laughing face of a handsome man, his hair and neatly trimmed goatee nearly black to match the coat he wore. His laughter came in great peals as it echoed around the TARDIS, and the way it reverberated nearly drove Russell mad. Through it all, the Doctor stood firm, his face showing a mixture of disgust and disappointment as he waited for the infernal laughter to cease.  
"Oh, come now, Doctor," he showed his teeth in a dazzling grin, "I knew a day when you would appreciate a ruse of this caliber."  
"One should never impersonate a Dalek," the Doctor shot back darkly, "The entire universe knows that one boundary of good taste."  
"Except, of course, for me."  
"Except for you, Master."  
"I do like it when you use my name," he continued to smile, "I'm also pleasantly surprised to see that you have a stockpile of terraforming fog disinfectant onboard your TARDIS. Always prepared, Doctor?"  
"I visit some rather unsavory places," the Doctor replied off-handedly, "but none more caustic than the presence of your company."  
"Oh, don't be so angry, Doctor. At your age, you're bound to get wrinkles."  
"Enough!" the Doctor spat, "What are you doing with the fog? What could you possibly want with something that heals people?"  
"You think I can't be philanthropic?"  
"I know you to be more philatelist than a philanthropist," the Doctor adjusted his cuffs, his voice hiding none of its disdain, "I can't possibly imagine you helping anyone that isn't yourself."  
"Ah, but that was so long ago, Doctor," the Master said with a sigh, "before we became the last two children of Gallifrey, before our race was wiped from the very fabric of existence… how does that old song go? 'You don't know what you've got, until it's gone' or something like that?"  
"I'm not one for pop culture," the Doctor continued to snarl, "What do you want with that fog?"  
"Excuse me!"  
Russell felt his knees wobble as he stepped between the two bickering Time Lords.  
"How can you both stand here and argue while people are dying, have died back on Panacea? How can you have a petty little…spat among all of that carnage? How can you stand it, both of you?"  
The Doctor bowed his head slightly, and the Master broke into another Cheshire grin.  
"Well, why don't you tell him, Doctor? Why don't you tell him what I know, and what you know?"  
"Let me guess," Russell said, his arms folded, "That both of you somehow knew, in your glorious cosmic wisdom, what was supposed to happen today. You knew that those people were supposed to die, because that's the Nature of Time or some such baloney… am I right?"  
The Doctor nodded slightly, and the Master chuckled.  
"My my… you have become so strong in the time I've known you, Mr. Garamond."  
Russell stabbed his index finger toward the projection screen.  
"That's Dr. Garamond to you, pal."  
He walked over and put a comforting arm on the Doctor's shoulder.  
"And a great, strange little man once told me that just because you know someone dies, it doesn't mean you shouldn't grieve."  
"And that is why you always fail, Doctor," the Master's words were bitter and harsh, "Your grief and your human emotions nearly drive you mad. It's why you ran away so long ago, wasn't it? You just couldn't stand the lack of… love?"  
"You weren't any better, Master," the Doctor replied. His head rose slowly as twin shards of blue ice shot out from under the porkpie brim.  
"You ran away, too."  
"I was stifled," the Master snorted, folding his arms, "The Time Lord Academy was no place for someone of my talents."  
"The Sulphir Plains of Barkhum are more appropriate," the Doctor retorted. The Master clucked his tongue and shook his head.  
"Is this what we've been reduced to in our old age, Doctor? Shouting back and forth like impotent old men? This is not the way the last of our race should be. We had such power, we had such knowledge, and yet we limited ourselves. Why? Arrogance and ego, nothing more. The Time Lords of old believed that by limiting themselves, it made them aware of their own power, and therefore made themselves more powerful. They believed themselves to be minor gods, when they simply could have taken the stars in the palms of their hands and become gods themselves! The true foolishness of the Time Lords was not their adherence to the laws… it was their refusal to break them!"  
The Master held out his hand to the Doctor, almost beckoning.  
"Doctor, I know you agree with me. You did the same thing I did, you rebelled against their rules and their laws, their foolishness. Come with me, let us make Gallifrey what it always could have been… what it should have been! Let us make our people great again!"  
"With the crown resting squarely atop your head, I suppose?" the Doctor shot back with biting sarcasm, "One thousand years, Master… one thousand years we've been in each other's presence, from the nursery… and you still don't get it. Why don't you ever understand, Master? When will you ever understand that I simply… don't care? I was the best student at the academy, and I didn't care. I was elected President of the High Council, and I ran away. I was given the opportunity to end the Time War… and I hated it! Don't you understand, Master, can't you understand? I don't want it, I never wanted it… and I never understood your hunger for it. The power, the influence, the ability to bend and crush others to your whim… why do you want it so? The only reason I've fought you, across galaxies, across dimensions, across time itself… is because someone has to be there to stop you. If you just learned to let it go, Master, to put aside your grudges and your hatred and your hundreds of years of seething lusts… I would never bother you again."  
He walked a bit closer to the projection screen until he was nearly as tall as the Master's goatee.  
"I gave you that chance, Master. When you returned, I wanted so much for you to have finally learned. I figured… I figured that the destruction of two civilizations, including your own, might affect you, might teach you… I gave you a fresh start, a new TARDIS, anything you could want to live a decent life… but you just couldn't resist, could you? The liquor that you consume is just too potent to give up, and it is a taste I simply cannot stand. Please, Master… we're the only two left… just… call off whatever plan you've concocted this time, just let it go. I don't want to fight you anymore, I don't want to have to feel that feeling… just… for God's sake, be good."  
The Master's lip curled into a derisive sneer.  
"Listen to you. 'For God's sake.' How repulsively human. You say you don't care, Doctor, and you wish to raise yourself above the arrogance that ended our people… but you are more arrogant even than them."  
"It is not arrogant to not want to fight."  
"It is arrogant to think yourself above the fight!" the Master shouted, "We are adversaries, Doctor! Nemeses! We cannot help but fight! Without one of us, the other would surely waste away! You cannot deny that I am as much you as you are me!"  
The Doctor looked at him blankly for a few moments, as if attempting to reason the statement, then suddenly spasmed in a surprising fit of chuckles, which led to another round of violent coughing.  
"Well," he said, wiping his mouth, "Nobody's perfect. Very well then, Master. Explain to me your newest and no doubt greatest plan, and I will stop you, as I always have."  
"So confident!" the Master chortled, "And yet minutes ago you looked ready to cry. Are you quite well, Doctor?"  
"Bit of a cough, but I'm learning to manage," the Doctor replied flatly.  
"You even wear a beard, just like me. How intriguing…"  
Without changing his expression, the Doctor pulled a sonic screwdriver from the inside pocket of his tan coat and immediately shone the blue light all over his face. In a trice, all the hair had fallen out onto the floor. This caused even more unsettlingly jovial laughter from the Master. The Doctor's voice remained cold and flat.  
"I believe you were leading up to the big reveal, Master. Pray, don't keep us waiting."  
"Oh, you will find out soon enough. But first, why don't you come aboard my… borrowed ship?"  
"Doctor," Russell asked under his breath, "where on Earth did he get a Dalek ship if they're all… you know…"  
"Precisely!" the Doctor shouted, causing all in attendance to jump back, "You are so very smart when you want to be, Mr. Garamond, it's a pity you don't try to think more often. He raises a very good point, Master: how did you get a Dalek ship if I burned the Daleks out of time and space? Surely you didn't spend all that time and a ridiculous amount of money building replica ships and little, tiny replica Daleks to fit your… Master plan, did you?"  
The Master looked a little uncomfortable in his silence.  
"Doctor, that was a terrible joke," Colleen said softly, reprimanding the strange man for both his terrible timing in the wake of tragedy and his penchant for bad jokes.  
"The only bad joke is here," the Doctor said, pointing at the Master's projected face, "This cruel clown is hopping about the galaxies masquerading as the scourge of the universe, and for what? To steal a little terraforming fog?"  
"Did he really make a replica of a Dalek warship?" Russell asked, trying to look into the projection to see detail. The Master began to shift in his seat, uncomfortable at all the unsavory attention.  
"Of course not," the Doctor scoffed, "His TARDIS just has the Gallifreyan equivalent to rhinestones and sequins: a working Chameleon Circuit."  
"What does any of this have to do with a bog-eyed lizard?"  
"Everything, Mr. Garamond. You see, when Time Lords travel in time, they don't want to upset the balance or throw turmoil into history. As such, we built our ships with the ability to change their appearance, disguise, and blend in. My TARDIS spent a good many years in a 20th century scrapyard as my granddaughter and I learned about humanity."  
"Liar!" The Master shouted, "You stole that old TARDIS off a trash heap and ran, like a scared little child! All those rumors about you, who you used to be and who you really are… what rubbish!"  
The Doctor ignored him completely and continued talking to Russell.  
"The TARDIS got stuck as an old police telephone box, and I've kept it that way ever since. The Master, on the other hand…"  
He turned back to the projection to see the Master glaring at him.  
"You're certainly not taking this seriously, Doctor."  
"At my age, I can't afford to," he shot back an aside, then launched back into a proclaiming voice, "The Master, on the other hand, has decided to turn his TARDIS into a replica of a Dalek warship, no doubt to inspire terror and fear and allow him to get away with all sorts of terrible, nasty things, am I right?"  
It was now the Doctor's turn to grin at his old enemy, but it wasn't a grin of a amusement, more a grin of the pride leader challenging a daring young cub. The Master stayed silent, glowering. The Doctor kept on talking, and Russell noticed as he did that the smile from the Doctor's face fell little by little, word by word, until it was a mask of pure anger.  
"But to what end? That is always the tricky part. You've had all sorts of schemes in the past, haven't you? How many have died for your whims? How many civilizations have been irrevocably altered and damaged because of your ideas? How many times has the very boundaries of our universe been stretched to its limits by you and your terrible plans. HOW MANY, MASTER? HOW MANY PEOPLE HAVE YOU KILLED, JUST TODAY?!"  
He collapsed into another fit of coughing, swearing dark oaths between gasping breaths and hacking coughs. For a while there was nothing but coughing and cursing heard around the TARDIS, and finally there was silence… but not for long.  
"Oh, Doctor… perhaps, it is finally you who does not understand. For today, I did what I did not for the pleasure of snuffing out life… but for creating it."  
"Nothing is worth murdering dozens of people," Russell said, helping the Doctor as best he could.  
"That wasn't life they were living," the Master sniffed, "It was a cruel parody. That fog was an umbilical cord for useless, milksop urchins. They didn't deserve the miracle of that fog… but, what I intend to do with it… yes, THAT will surely be a miracle!"  
The Doctor shrugged Russell's long, thing fingers off his shoulder and straightened his shoulders, looking face to face with his ancient foe. His eyes were red and lidded with the ferocity of the coughing, but they still peered sharply out at the task ahead, almost as if lying in wait, or suspecting an ambush. The Master never spoke of creating life, the Doctor thought. In faith, he had never seen the Master show mercy to a single living being. What was it he was planning? He straightened the porkpie hat on top of his head and blinked twice, hard.  
"Show me."

"Doctor, what in the Hell is going on?!"  
Russell was practically chasing the Doctor all around the TARDIS as the strange man was preparing. He was stuffing his pockets with seemingly anything that came to hand: biscuits, teacups, a handkerchief, a small figurine of a donkey, three sonic screwdrivers, two pairs of Pince-nez spectacles, an icepick. a handful of hazelnuts, and so on.  
"Your pants are going to fall off if you keep jamming stuff into them…"  
"Please don't distract me, Mr. Garamond!" the Doctor pleaded angrily, tugging on his tan jacket, "I'm having trouble keeping everything straight as it is."  
"Why?"  
The Doctor adjusted his lapels and gave a shrug, feeling the camelhair fit right about his shoulders. He looked directly at Russell, his eyes clear and blue, his voice frank and unadorned.  
"Because the Master has never spoken like this in the centuries I have known him. He has always been a master of destruction, of chaos, of murder and death and discord. To hear him speak of philanthropy is…"  
"Troubling?"  
"And yet fascinating," the Doctor tapped an index finger to his pursed lips.  
"You really hope he's changed, don't you?" Russell said, marveling. He could still remember the horrors he'd seen at the hands of the Master, and the countless atrocities he'd either read or heard about in their travels. The Master had not been idle since his return: stealing, murdering, cheating, and so on, renewing his trail of infamy across the galaxies. They had been to several planets, space stations, and interstellar colonies, and everywhere people spoke of the Master with dark and frightened tones. And here, the man who has known him the longest, who has seen the majority of his wrongdoings first hand…  
"I must know," the Doctor nodded, almost distractedly, "I can't trust him, not after everything… but if he can truly help the universe, if he truly wishes to do good…"  
The Doctor's voice trailed off as he bolted from one of the many antechambers, all conversation forgotten. Russell hot on his heels, remarking to himself how the Doctor seemed more scatterbrained than ever. He began to marvel at the Time Lord mind and its capacity for knowledge and capabilities, and yet he felt a great amount of pity for the Doctor as he sped around, his hands seeming to move of their own accord to approve or reject nearly every item in every room of the TARDIS. All those minds, all those memories, all that history locked away in his head… how did it all not consume him? Throughout all the adventures, he'd never really seen this. sure, the Doctor had his… quirks, but so did everyone. This, however… this was bad. Something about the Master always put the Doctor ill at ease, made him grumpier even than usual. Russell noticed, with a hard laugh, that he often acted the same way around his ex-wife.  
"Something funny, Mr. Garamond?"  
"I'm just glad you're wearing suspenders, with all you're stuffing in those pockets."  
The Doctor pulled his braces out from under his vest and gave them a tug. His voice was still businesslike and tense.  
"One of the benefits of subspace trouser pockets, Mr. Garamond. Almost completely weightless. Is Colleen ready?"  
"We both are."  
"Good," he said, brushing past the gangly surgeon back to the main console room, "because I'm not."  
They met up with Colleen in the console room, and the Doctor fiddled with a few devices until one of the integrated flatscreens buzzed into life. The three stood in front of the screen as the Master's face came into view, much smaller but no less intimidating.  
"Have you turned off all the lights, Doctor?" the Master called with a mocking tone, "I promise nothing will happen to your TARDIS while you've got it parked. At its age, I'd be surprised if anything else CAN happen to that ship."  
"Spare us the meager witticisms," the Doctor stuffed both hands into his jacket pockets, "bring us on board if you want so much to show us your magnum opus."  
"Why don't you come on in, then?" the Master grinned.  
"I'd rather you send a cab," the Doctor sniffed, "I'm afraid you might scratch my paint job."  
"As you wish," the Master nodded, and the screen went blank. Colleen and Russell exchanged a look.  
"Doctor, why don't we…?" Russell made a motion with his hand as if to simulate flying into the ship.  
"TARDISes are dimensionally transcendent constructs," the Doctor explained with a level voice, "placing one inside another can wreak havoc on the fabric between dimensions."  
"Of course," Colleen nodded, "You can't transcend a transcender, it'd be like turning a box in on itself ad infinitum."  
"Quite right, my dear. A tear in subspace is something I don't want to deal with on top of everything else."  
Russell remembered the Doctor's claim of subspace trousers, and was inclined to agree.  
"So how are we going to get there?"  
"A transmat beam, more than likely. Which reminds me…"  
He spent a good time digging into his inside jacket pocket, searching for something beyond the confines of camelhair and thread. Finally, his arm returned, clutching three sonic screwdrivers in his fist. He kept one for himself and tossed the other two to Russell and Colleen.  
"What are these for?" Russell asked, a little worried."  
"Always be prepared, Mr. Garamond."  
"Makes you sound like a boy scout."  
The Doctor fiddled nervously with the screwdriver in his hand.  
"Believe me, Mr. Garamond, this will prove far more handy than a simple pocketknife. Ah!" he said with relief as a low hum began to echo around the TARDIS, "our cab is here!"  
There was a blinding flash of light, a sizzling sound of electricity, and suddenly they were all three standing in a towering, white room. As the Doctor began to look around, his vision seemed to be only in black and white, overcome with memories. This was how his TARDIS had looked when he first rescued it from that rubbish heap… he and Susan, so long ago… and all the life and the death and the danger and the thrill of it all had changed his ship in an unalterable way. It would never look like this again, all white and stark, with the roundels on the walls contrasting with the sharp, geometric console. How long had it been, he thought, since Ian, since Barbara… since he was thin, even? Sadly, the color started to leech back into his vision as the nostalgia faded, and a few items of the Master's tenure began to show themselves: a black coat draped over a chair, a sideboard with several dark liquors prominently displayed in elegant bottles, and a massive laboratory that took up the entire back wall, full of bubbling beakers, flasks, and pipets all moving in perfect harmony towards test tubes, centrifuges, and Petri dishes. At the lab, he could see the broad, muscular back of the Master, working away in a black vest and voluminous white sleeves. He turned to greet them, opening his arms in welcome. The Doctor, wishing to dispense with pleasantries, made to take a step forward, but Colleen's scream stopped him where he stood.  
"Doctor, look out!"  
The Doctor finally became aware of the buzzing electronic barriers that were keeping Russell and Colleen rooted to their spots. The barriers left very little room for movement, and crackled dangerously which what was nothing less than a lethal dose. The Doctor, rather than seem worried or frightened by the experience, merely heaved a sigh.  
"Honestly, Master. This is the best you can do?"  
"Wonderful thing about a Chameleon circuit," the Master chuckled, stepping forward until he was nearly face to face with the Doctor at the barrier, "If I input the information for a Dalek mothership, it comes with all the fun little bells & whistles."  
"Please," the Doctor sniffed contemptuously, "Do you really think this can hold me?"  
He casually produced the sonic screwdriver from his breast pocket. Before the Master could make a comment, the Doctor placed the device on the floor and drove the hard sole of his two-tone spectator shoe down onto the screwdriver, breaking it to pieces. An ear-splitting shriek issued from the broken device, causing Russell, Colleen, and the Master to cover their ears and causing the electrified barrier around the Doctor to flicker and fade. The Doctor stepped out from the barrier as if nothing was wrong, and as quickly as it had shrieked, the screwdriver fell silent. The Doctor coolly approached the Master, who was still clutching at his ears.  
"I learned that trick after the fall of the Panopticon, though I feel as I've just lost a friend… Master, can you hear me?"  
The Master slowly lowered his hands from his ears and drew himself back to his full, impressive height. The Doctor looked up to him with a playful sort of scorn and gave him a shove to the chest. The Master, still disoriented, stumbled backwards against the console.  
"It appears, my old adversary, that there's not a trick you can prestidigitate that I cannot find a way out of. Perhaps this conflict of ours has finally ended, with me the victor? Are we no longer evenly matched? Could it be that the power of my cold, calculating mind has finally defeated your hot, raging emotions, Master?"  
He turned to his two companions.  
"Colleen, dear… Mr. Garamond. Do as I did and relieve yourself of your imprisonment."  
Colleen immediately did as she was told, and Russell barely had time to block his ears as a second shriek pierced the air. Still, the Doctor did not even flinch. Finally, Russell steeled his nerve and stomped down as hard as he could on the screwdriver the Doctor had given him. Nothing happened.  
"That is why you should wear more sensible shoes, Mr. Garamond. Give me a moment, and I'll free you…"  
He turned back to the console to see, to his aggravation, that the Master had Colleen held fast, a shattered piece of the sonic screwdriver held to her throat. He regarded his enemy with an icy glare.  
"You know I can kill, Doctor, and you know I will to accomplish my goals," he began circling around the console of his TARDIS.  
"Well," the Doctor stuck his hands in his pockets and rocked back on his heels, "That certainly destroys any idea of your possible philanthropy."  
"Doctor!" Russell shouted from behind the barrier, still unable to break the sonic screwdriver with his rubber-soled shoes, "Don't just stand there!"  
The Doctor dismissed him with a wave.  
"It's all right, Mr. Garamond, it's all right. I know what this is about, and it's certainly not about Colleen. It's about recognition. You see, the Master is absolutely furious that I have been able to best him time and again, over and over. All he wants is for me to consider him dastardly and evil, no doubt. It's a peculiar thing, the relation between people. Without evil, there can be no good, so therefore someone must be lower than someone else. The knowledge of just where people stand gives them a sense of permanence, a sense of purpose, and it makes them feel… good. To the Master, feeling bad makes him feel good, and my… unwillingness to give him what he so desperately wants makes him so very, very angry… but I'm tired of it."  
He turned back to the Master, who was still holding the makeshift weapon to the girl's throat.  
"What's the point, Master? We fight, we don't fight, what's the difference in the end? You've never been able to defeat me, to kill me, to harm me, really. I always come back, you always come back, and it never ends! Why do you do it?"  
The Master reached behind himself on the console and flipped a number of switches.  
"Oh Doctor, you have been naive," he said with a venomous smile, "It's true, there is a certain…piquancy to the conflict that you and I have shared for so long, and it's true that I hunger and thirst for the opportunity to finally best you once and for all… but I came to a conclusion after what seemed like an eternity, locked inside your ship. I now know how I can truly beat you, and to beat you is to break you."  
'How very poetic," the Doctor raised an eyebrow, "I suppose you're going to tell me your grandiose plan now, building to a bombastic, villainous crescendo?"  
"Actually…"  
The Master flipped one more switch on his console, and in a flash of light the Doctor was gone, beamed back to his TARDIS via the transmat device. Before he could know what had occurred, the Master's voice seemed to come from everywhere inside the TARDIS. The Doctor scrambled to the flatscreen, where the Master was broadcasting. Russell and Colleen were both back in the containment field, and the Master had put his black jacket back on, leaning over the console and chuckling softly to himself.  
"You seem to forget, my dear Doctor, that for a long, long time I was part of your ship. I was absorbed into your TARDIS through the Eye of Harmony. I clung to your ship, and clung to my sanity, all the time plotting my revenge. I know your ship as I do the functions of my own body. When I move my arm…"  
He flipped a switch, and part of the Doctor's TARDIS began to grow dim. The Time Rotor suddenly went dark and immobile, and nothing the Doctor attempted in a feverish few seconds could bring it back online. The Master let his chuckles grow into that full, mocking laugh that crashed around the console room like breakers on the surf.  
"It's no use, Doctor! Your TARDIS is disabled, you're dead in the water. It took me decades to access that code. I'll never be able to process it again, and for that… I thank you. Thank you, Doctor, for bringing about my greatest plan. With you stranded, and with the help of your two little… friends… the new genesis of Gallifrey will begin! Catch me, Doctor, if you can!"  
There was a great groaning in space, and the Dalek mothership slowly dematerialized out of time, off for parts unknown. The Doctor was left in a scuttled ship, in silence, and alone.

Russell knew he had to remember.  
The details were hazy at best, Colleen couldn't remember any of it. The poor girl, all that she'd been through… and now this.  
"Well, well," the Master chuckled, still holding tight to Colleen, "Now that we've removed all distractions, perhaps we can get to work, hm?"  
"You know we'd rather die," Russell spat, the moisture from his mouth crackling on the electrical barrier that kept him from his wife.  
"Why is it that they always say that?" the Master pondered out loud, "Am I really that bad? All I want to do is ensure the best possible life for myself, isn't that what everyone wants?"  
"They don't usually commit genocide to do it."  
"I've never committed genocide," the Master replied, shocked. His indignation, however, soon turned into a wicked smile.  
"Not completely, anyway."  
Colleen gave a whimper and the Master held her a little tighter, drawing the broken shards of the sonic screwdriver closer to her ivory throat.  
"How can you live like this?" Russell cried, his heart aching for his wife's safety, "All that knowledge, all that power… your people are like gods to us, and yet you do the most horrible things… why? All that potential, all that–"  
"All that, all that!" the Master cut him off with a mocking tone, "Is that all you can say, you insipid little parrot? Didn't they used to say that on your planet, that someone was 'all that?' Well, yes, I suppose I do think that I am 'all that.'"  
He laughed a bit more and hugged Colleen a little closer, leaning down close until his nose was nearly touching the area near her jugular vein, parallel with the makeshift weapon. He saw the muscles in Russell's face tighten, and he grinned.  
"You sound just like him, you know, another one of his little pawns, believing the noble lie. You talk to me of genocide, but tell me… did you fight with the Doctor, side by side, battle by battle? Were you there to see his butchery at Serresenaw, or the way he sent so many Time Lords to their deaths overcoming the Dalek stronghold at Korrhum? Do not speak to me of genocide when you ally yourself with the one who murdered two entire races!"  
"That's not true!" Russell screamed.  
"DON'T YOU LIE TO ME!" The Master boomed back, shaking the very walls of his TARDIS, "I CAN'T FEEL THE PRESENCE OF GALLIFREY! MY HOME IS GONE!"  
"Why do you care?" Russell shouted back, hearing some of his hair sizzle on the barrier as he leaned forward, "You tried to destroy the planet! You fled the Time War! You left your people to die!"  
"They were not my people," the Master shot back bitterly, "Merely my unsubjugated."  
"What?" Russell blinked in disbelief.  
"You don't think I got a name like 'the Master' because I chose it, do you?"  
"Actually, I did."  
"The only thing I chose to do," the Master grinned, struggling a little as Colleen squirmed, "Was to MAKE them call me 'Master.' First in my class, of noble birth; scholar, athlete, philosopher. I was the most remarkable candidate to come out of the Time Lord Academy since its founding. I would have been Chancellor, President over the high council… but I preferred to be… Master. Master over all, ruling Gallifrey like the Kings and Queens of old, my will absolute!"  
"Because you were good in school?" Russell raised his eyebrows skeptically.  
"Because I deserved it!" the Master hissed, "but the Doctor, that low-born idiot, that half-breed, that pusillanimous creature and insult to our race… he robbed me of my right. He took my kingdom from me!"  
Russell suddenly had a mental flash of that little orange world in a bottle, all the while with Jim Croce in his ears. He answered almost involuntarily, as if he hasn't meant to say it out loud.  
"… but Gallifrey isn't gone…"  
The Master's eyes grew wide and his jaw grew slack with shock.  
"What?"  
His arms had gone slack with the shock as well, and Colleen took the opportunity to use a few tricks taught to her by an old friend. She drove an elbow into the Master's midsection and brought her hard-soled shoe down onto his instep. The Master howled in pain, staggering backwards, giving Colleen the option for escape. She chose, instead to reach for the console of the Master's TARDIS, and the fearsome weapon of the Master's known as the Tissue Compression Eliminator mere instants before the Master could grasp it. She pointed it at the Time Lord and, without a second thought, fired.

Meanwhile, the Doctor was in complete misery. He sat on the floor of the console room next to his disabled TARDIS, head in his hands. How could he have been so stupid, so careless? He had been arrogant, proud, just like the Master, and what did it get him? His companions, gone. His ship, damaged. The Master's plan? Who could say. The Doctor sat there, cursing himself over and over. What made him better than the Master now? He had been pompous and preening, maybe even more than his old enemy, and now Russell and Colleen… he could only shudder to think of what horrors lay in store. He knew that his friends would resist, and he knew that the Master did not tolerate resistance…  
"What have I done?"  
He wished for something, anything, to help him, but nothing came. The only break in the oppressive silence were occasional bouts of his coughing. No ghosts of Doctors past, locked away in the myriad of TARDIS corridors, no wise words from former companions, even the TARDIS was silent, robbed of its usual hum and activity. The Doctor took the chocolate brown porkpie hat from his head and stared at it a while, casting it aside with a frustrated snarl.  
"Stupid old man."  
He leaned back and shouted to the echoing ceiling.  
"You've certainly put yourself over the barrel this time, haven't you? Haven't you?"  
There was no answer. The Doctor let his head sink back down.  
"Stupid old man."  
Silence reigned again for a few moments as the Doctor sulked in the dark. Then, like a firefly, a tiny blue light began to blink from across the room. It bathed the console room in a weak blue light, causing the Doctor to raise his head and identify the peculiar source of power in an otherwise powerless ship. Like a child, the Doctor crawled the few feet across the floor to the light, which was emitting the blue light from underneath the band, tucked inside the hat. The Doctor picked up his hat gently, as if afraid to ruin the magic, and gingerly fished out what the blinking object. He identified it immediately as a piece of cyber-technology, a shining piece of silver with interlaced circuitry and dazzling technological beauty. It was shining from a single blue light in the center, a tiny thing that seemed to fill the room now that it had been uncovered. The Doctor's face was perfectly blue as he regarded the tiny piece of metal.  
"A cyberman wouldn't make this," he mused to himself, "It's too beautiful. That pattern isn't be from Mondas, either."  
The metal and circuitry had been molded into a triangle, a Celtic triangle made of several different shapes, all in one continuous line. There was a place on the design where the lines intersected, forming a cradle for the tiny blue light that was still blinking merrily. The Doctor held the tiny piece of silverwork in his hands and smiled. He knew what it was.  
"Triquetra."  
He rose to his feet, neatly sliding one of his two-tone spectators into the hat and, with one deft movement, flicking it upwards into his free hand. With a flourish, he popped the hat back on his head and headed back to the center console. He carefully placed the Triquetra into a small aperture on the console, and almost immediately the ship took to it. Suddenly, the entire console room was glowing blue, a glittering ocean of light, and with a triumphant sound, the TARDIS sprang back to life. The Doctor gave a shout of happiness as he ran his hands over the console of his old ship, smiling broadly.  
"Remarkable girl, that Colleen. Simply remarkable."  
The Triquetra in the aperture gave a small creak and then cracked in two, crumbling into a fine silver dust as the light grew dim.  
"No!" the Doctor shouted, trying his best to harvest the tiny grains of silver, "no, no, no, no! How am I supposed to track her if… oh, damn it all!"  
He threw another fit and sulked into a chair near the console, pulling a sour face.  
"Fantastic. Just fantastic! I've got my ship back, but I don't know where in time or space or Heaven or Hell they are! If only I hadn't been so brash, so foolish, if only I hadn't destroyed my sonic–"  
He slapped a hand to the breast pocket of his camelhair coat where the sonic screwdriver.  
"Sonic…"  
The realization dawned on him, and he suddenly sprang up from the chair and began running around the console, constantly chattering the word "sonic" over and over again. It's said that a TARDIS was originally meant to be piloted by several Time Lords, and now, all alone, the Doctor was a dervish around the console: flipping switches, turning dials, pressing buttons, and several other tiny tasks.  
"Sonic, sonic, sonic! I can track that sonic signal, I know I can. No one makes a sonic screwdriver like me! I can track them through space and time, because I know the Master won't destroy it. No, he'll want to keep it as some kind of war trophy, no doubt. Arrogant to the end! Well, I'll show him how arrogant I can be, won't I, old girl?"  
He patted the console and the TARDIS seemed to coo in approval. The Doctor slammed one lever into place with a triumphant "HA!" and the ship took off. The Doctor looked up with pride, seeing the time rotor in action, and smiled.  
"Good old Mr. Garamond, and his very insensible shoes!"  
The TARDIS sped off for time and space unknown, hot on the heels of the Master and his prisoners.

Colleen Garamond, formerly Colleen Ciradh, was a quiet woman, of that there was no mistake, but at no point was her quietness ever an indication of her lack of thought or involvement. As a 19th century woman with cybernetic implants, she was constantly in conflict with herself: a brain that ran faster than a leopard with sensibilities that more befit a kitten. She was kind, and generous, always willing to help or to do the work that no one else wanted, but always quiet and standing in the background of her own volition. It was a result of the tortures she endured at the hands of a Cyber-Controller in what seemed like a place so long ago, it was those pains that kept her silent, that kept her kind and courteous when others may have grown bitter or greedy. She had been raised in a good family, all of them gone now, starved by a ruling nation who gladly exported grain from Ireland while its people starved by the wayside. Colleen Garamond had lived a difficult life, that much is certain, but her faith and her beliefs in propriety and piety kept her going strong, if usually silent.  
She spoke very little, but not because she didn't have anything to say. She reacted, she participated, her face spoke volumes of emotion and experiences in its smooth, freckled, forever-young surface. She simply didn't speak because she was afraid to. She never knew what thoughts would be hers, and which would be the thoughts of the metal men who slaughtered her neighbors and attempted to assimilate them. Even the word "assimilate" wasn't hers, yet it was in her mind somehow and she understood it. She understood so much, yet so very little, as the heart of her heart, not her cybernetic one, sought to reconcile with the powerful mind she possessed. She'd done much to keep the mind busy, of course, and the TARDIS proved to be a playground perfectly fit for her: so many books to read, so many rooms to clean to a spotless shine, so many animals to tend in the onboard zoos and menageries. And then, there was Russell, her husband. He had always been so understanding. He never demanded that she talk or that she participate; if anything, he was usually telling her to put the broom and mop away and sit next to him. When she was with him, she always felt so comfortable, it was like wherever they were, it was that beautiful, silent, black and white garden on a far off planet. Everything was calm and simple and easy to understand when she was with him… and yet there was always the fear, always the worry that she wouldn't be able to control her implanted parts, her heart, her brain, the augmentations to her muscular and skeletal system… there was always a fear that she wouldn't be able to control what she said, or did, and as she looked at the Master, weapon in hand, her cybernetic mind agonized over the decision forever. Forever, of course, to a cyberman.

Russell knew he had to remember.  
It was the single most terrifying sight of anything he'd seen in all the time he'd spent traveling in time and space. After Colleen fired on the Master, the console room of the renegade Time Lord's TARDIS was bathed in a bright golden light as energy seemed to explode from the Master's body. Golden threads and flecks dance about him from head to toe, swirling in a maelstrom as the Master they knew slowly died and was replaced before their very eyes. The screaming was nearly unbearable, because it seemed like two people screaming at once. One voice they recognized, the other was higher, reedier, and unfamiliar. Colleen and Russell both watched, aghast, as the Master's face began to warp and change in the golden light, twisting and bending with different ages, hair colors, nose shapes, and so on. Finally, however, it appeared that the current Master was gaining the upper hand, as he began to laugh so loud that it seemed all the glasswork on his lab table would burst. It wasn't simply him laughing, either, but the laughter of his voice and several other voices, possible future or past Masters, all in horrible unison. Finally, with a shout, the Master brought himself to his feet and thrust both his arms out. In a swirling spike, the golden energy flew clear across the control room to the laboratory area, where it appeared to be swallowed up into a tall, black, box-shaped device in the corner. The machine began to hum, and suddenly it seemed as if the entire laboratory came to life: beakers began to bubble, test tubes were filled, and the piping between it all was buzzing with activity and flowing with peculiar liquids, and all the time the Master, still as he was, was laughing. He rounded on Colleen with a mad, hungry glare in his eyes. The Irish girl's nerve failed her, and she dropped the TCE in fright. The Master grabbed her roughly by the wrist and wrenched her over to where Russell still stood, powerless within the deadly barrier.  
"You should keep better track of your woman," he said with a malevolent chuckle, "She's just bound to get into trouble, you know…"  
He threw her to the floor and, with the push of a button, a new barrier was erected around her, trapping her. The Master approached them both, replacing the TCE in the pocket of his long, black coat.  
"I suppose you're wondering what all this is about," he said, almost merry as he flippantly threw a hand about him, gesturing to the laboratory, "As I told the Doctor, I am creating life."  
"Is this the part where you give the whole evil plan away?" Russell shot back, sounding bored. The Master regarded him with a bit of frustration, as if Russell had caught him in the cliche.  
"Well," the Master replied, a little huffy as he came closer and closer to Russell, "I was going to tell you, but you're being so very rude, I suppose I ought to just get on with your… punishment."  
"Just get it over with," Russell swallowed hard, summoning all his courage, "There's nothing you can do to me…"  
The Master cut him off with one extended index finger in a black velvet glove.  
"Ah, how true. You are brave, you are stoic, you are the handsome hero of this tale, are you not? The Doctor has taught you well, I see. Very well," he gave a little, flourishing bow, "I concede. You are the good and noble man, and nothing I can do will remove that. However…"  
He walked away from Russell, his heels clicking on the metal floor all the way to Colleen.  
"I do wonder," he said, running a finger so close along the barrier that the electricity crackled between it and the glove, "How you might react if I were to…take care of your little wife first…"  
"Don't you touch her, you son of a…"  
"Or what? You'll kill me? Your woman already tried, Mr. Garamond–"  
"That's Doctor Garamond to you, pal."  
"In fact," the Master continued, unhindered, "She very nearly triggered a full regeneration. Luckily, I have my little contraption in the corner," he gestured to the box, "And the energy fits so very well in there. I should thank you, actually, Colleen, my dear…"  
Something about the way he said those last three words made Russell's blood boil.  
"I was fully planning to trigger a regeneration effect in myself, but now I don't have to bring myself to inflicting self-harm. How wonderful, hm? Now…"  
He walked back to the console and pressed a button, making sure to keep the TCE pointed at Colleen the entire time she was out of the containment barrier. Colleen was still mostly human, and it was her human fears, the fears of simple, innocent farm girl far out of her element, that kept her from fighting back. Russell knew he had to remember, even though he'd take lifetimes trying to forget. He wanted to forget how the Master strapped his wife down to a table and, while she was alive, began harvesting parts of her: her flesh, her organs, little by little, molecule by molecule to add to his damned scheme. He mentioned more than once about how he was planning to populate an asteroid into his own personal kingdom using the Panaceaen fog and something called the Hand of Omega, and Russell wanted so much to not hear, because to hear the scattered bits of the Master's plan was also to hear, and to see, as he tore his wife apart, piece by piece… but still, somehow, through a perversion of Time Lord science and technology, she still lived, and she continued to look over to Russell, helpless, alone, and impotent, and she kept telling him not to worry, not to cry, and she continued to hold the Celtic cross her mother gave her that hung around her neck close to her heart… until the Master finally took away her arms. Yet still, she lived. The Master kept her alive, and he kept her alive so she would have to watch as he did the same to Russell. And finally, when it was all done, Russell looked over at his wife, and she looked over at him, and she smiled, because she was with him, and the world was simple and easy to understand again. Through torrents of tears he couldn't stop, Russell smiled back, and the pain of the situation, not of the physical loss, is what allowed everything to go mercilessly black. Even as he kept whispered to Colleen "I love you, I love you," his mind was continually chanting something else, and it was simply the word:  
"Remember."

Russell was back on his family's old farmhouse, west of Chicago and next door to paradise. Except this time, the farmhouse didn't melt away to reveal a TARDIS. In fact, there was no TARDIS at all. No Doctor at all. Just he and Colleen and what seemed like a Norman Rockwell painting: her preparing breakfast, he reading a newspaper, the two of them enjoying bacon and eggs, free of the guilt of fat and cholesterol, gazing lovingly across the table, her in a linen shirtwaist dress and him in slacks, suspenders, and a comfortable Oxford shirt. The days seemed to go one after the other: going into the local supermarket, tending to livestock, bringing in a harvest, and always being together, always in love. Colleen symbolized what Russell was always trying to find in life, what he was always trying to get back to. He had moved from the country into Chicago proper as a child, and he'd spent almost his entire life trying to get back. Even this doctor gambit was just a way to make enough money to get back out into the country. Colleen was what he'd been wanting to get back to: she was calm, she was friendly, and she seemed to enjoy the simple life that Russell knew he couldn't find on his own. Colleen…no, her name wasn't even Colleen, it was Maire, an Irish version of Mary… but she hated that name so much! He'd use it to tease her, and he always felt it so strange that she'd prefer her father's pet name for her, Colleen, which was simply Irish for "girl." But still, Colleen was what she liked, so Colleen it would be.  
Colleen…  
Colleen…  
My God…what did they do to Colleen?  
Russell could hear his heart, feel his heart again, feel the blood coursing through his veins. He couldn't quite figure out why, but it seemed so loud, as if he hadn't heard it before. Then, little by little, he began to remember. The Master, that horrible man, had picked apart Russell and his wife life a carrion bird would pick over carcasses, feeding them into some ghastly machine to create a new race, combining their DNA with his. The last time he remembered seeing Collen, there was scarcely anything left to her, and yet through some horrible science, or magic, or both, they still lived, and they felt no pain. A memory crashed over Russell like a tidal wave, and he heard his own voice as he remembered it, screaming as he broke under the sheer mental torment.  
"Why are you doing this?! Why are you keeping us alive?!"  
And he remembered the Master's face, so calm and cordial though his hands dripped with gore, lean down close to him and whisper.  
"I have tried to kill the Doctor, and I have tried to kill his companions. Never once have I succeeded in a true victory. But here, bringing him the indescribable pain of failing you, knowing that he is powerless… when he sees what I have done to you… it will break him, and I will finally have won."  
Russell's head seemed to throb from the memories. He instinctively clapped his hands to the sides of his heads and stayed there a moment before he realized, with no small surprise, that he had hands again. And arms. And legs. He was completely whole, somehow brought back from less than life to full restoration, right down to his fingernails. He was mareveling at it all, like a child with a kaleidoscope, when a familiar voice interrupted him.  
"I see you're awake."  
He glanced in the direction of the voice and saw the Doctor, seated comfortably on the other end of a table. It was only the second time Russell had seen him without a necktie of some sorts, and he didn't seem to be wearing a vest, either. His shirt even looked a little rumpled, which only confused Russell more. They appeared to be in another lab, thought this one seemed to be onboard the Doctor's TARDIS. Russell doubted the Master had the same frenetic design sense as the Doctor. There was only one question he could ask as the Doctor sat there, smiling.  
"What did you do?"  
"Consider me all the kings' horses and all the kings' men," the Doctor threw his hands out wide, beaming, "You're very welcome, Mr. Dumpty."  
"How did you… do all of this?"  
The Doctor twittered his eyebrows and grinned again.  
"Magic," he said in a dramatic voice.  
"Don't give me that," Russell said sourly, taking his first few tottering steps off the upright gurney he'd been strapped to, "and could you get any more Frankenstein than this?"  
He gestured to the slabs behind him without bothering to turn around. The Doctor smiled and got a wistful look in his eye.  
"Ah, Mary… such an interesting girl. Shame about Percy, though. Still, if I remember my 'pop culture' correctly," he said those words as if they were a pesky mosquito, "I believe that Frankenstein's monster was later given… a bride."  
He held out his hand with a flourish, beckoning Russell to turn around. Russell's gangly form spun about to see Colleen just as she always was, strapped onto her own vertical slab. Russell couldn't help it, the tears poured from his eyes, completely unhidden as he wept to see his wife safe and sound.  
"Happy Anniversary," the Doctor called from across the room, "It's been about a year, all told. A year since your wedding."  
"It's been a year?" Russell murmured, running his hands across his chest as if wondering if it would all crumble away.  
"Since your wedding," the Doctor clarified, "it was an awful lot of work, you can't begrudge me a little time."  
"Not at all, not at all…" Russell was back to staring at his hands, but his gaze kept coming back to Colleen. She looked so peaceful, like she was asleep.  
"Doctor," he asked, tears welling up again, "Is she… okay?"  
He turned back to the Doctor behind the table, who broke into another grin.  
"She's better than okay, Mr. Garamond. Although she's taking a bit longer to come out of stasis than you did. I did you both the favor of implanting a few nodes into your memory cortices. You both deserve some good dreams…"  
"Oooooh, Russell…"  
Both Russell and the Doctor jerked their necks toward Colleen, obviously enjoying a particular kind of dream. Russell could feel himself blush to the eartips as the Doctor stroked a handlebar moustache and Van Dyke beard. It was the way Russell remembered him, but the beard seemed less full than it had before, more neatly trimmed. It better framed his face as he constantly smiled.  
"Like I said," the Doctor's eyes grew wide and he heaved a sigh, "You both deserved to have some good dreams… even if I had to force you."  
His voice trailed off, a little sad, a little bitter. Now that he knew Colleen was all right, Russell had a litany of questions bursting to get out.  
"Doctor, what happened here?"  
"Don't ask."  
"What happened to those… things the Master was trying to create?"  
The Doctor avoided Russell's eyes and stared at the table.  
"Those genetic abominations are gone."  
"And the Master?"  
"He's gone, too."  
"Please, Doctor," Russell rolled his eyes, "don't be so vague…"  
He looked back down to see the Doctor glaring at him with piercing eyes, his jaw set dangerously tight, all of the skin on his face looking pulled and tense. Russell couldn't tell if he was trying not to scream, or cry, but he knew he wanted to change the subject before the Doctor stared a hole through him.  
"Er, so…" Russell stuffed his hands in his pockets, "How was that all going to work, anyway? I thought the Master hated the idea of mixing with human blood."  
"At the molecular level, Mr. Garamond," the Doctor shifted where he sat, "we're all the same. Only the Master would take such a lovely sentiment and do what he tried to do with it."  
"You said his experiments…"  
"Abominations," the Doctor corrected him.  
"…were gone. Does that mean that…the parts of us are gone, too?"  
The Doctor traced a pattern embossed on the table with his finger.  
"Sadly, yes. I… wasn't able to save most of your corporeal form."  
"So what are we, then? Robots? Those Cyber-people?"  
The Doctor laughed a little at that, a dry, little laugh.  
"No, no. I am proud to say that you are both 100% organic material… again."  
He smiled at Russell, waiting to see when it would finally dawn on him.  
"You mean…!"  
It didn't take long. Russell turned back to his wife with stars in his eyes.  
"Yes," the Doctor responded, not even knowing if it was necessary, "You'll have children, Mr. Garamond. You and Colleen will have a family."  
As if on cue, that last word caused Colleen's eyes to flutter open. She looked down from the slab and saw Russell, and her face immediately took on an expression of exhultant joy and calm relief. So much so, in fact, that she nearly fainted and fell from the vertical slab. Russell caught her and held her, laughing, crying, and kissing her all at once.  
"Oh, God, Colleen," he said over and over, "I love you, I love you, I love you so much!"  
"Russell," she reached up and touched his face, smiling, "I feel so light."  
"You don't have your cybernetic parts anymore, honey," Russell grinned, "The Doctor made you human again!"  
She gave him a look of disbelief.  
"Go ahead if you don't believe me!" he giggled, "What's Pi to fifteen digits?"  
Colleen looked at him with a mix of confusion and elation.  
"I don't know!" she finally exclaimed, wrapping her arms around her husband's neck. Russell held her tight as he stood up again, setting his little wife by his side. He had to hold her close to him, as she was like a newborn colt and her legs wobbled where she stood. They both looked over to the Doctor, still by the table, and Russell spoke for them both.  
"Doctor, I…" his mouth moved, but words were hard to come, "I can't thank you enough! WE can't thank you enough! What you've done here, Doctor… it's nothing short of a miracle!"  
"Miracles are the work of a god, Mr. Garamond," the Doctor said sadly. He finally moved from his place behind the table, and as he seemed to glide over to them, they both saw with absolute shock that the Doctor was wheeling himself about in a wheelchair… and that both of his legs were gone.  
"And, as you can see…" the Doctor gave one small, sad smile, "I am no god."  
There was a long and horrid silence between the three. The Doctor finally ended it with a scoff.  
"Come on, you two. We all knew I needed to lose some weight, anyway. And on the brighter side, my cough is gone."  
He began to wheel himself back to the table, with Russell hot on his heels, following by a weeping Colleen.  
"Doctor…"  
"Don't even start, Mr. Garamond," the Doctor still had a bit of his sternness in him, "I did it because I had to."  
He stopped and turned round to face his companions, discomfort etched on his haggard features.  
"What you said about making Colleen human again… it isn't exactly true."  
Russell and Colleen held themselves in a rapt silence. When the Doctor was ready, he began again.  
"You are now both technically more Gallifreyan than human. Congratulations, you are the new progenitors of the Gallifreyan race."  
He said that last bit with a sarcastically regal wave of his hand, then continued on, wheeling his way about the TARDIS and adjusting bits and pieces in the elaborate technological mish-mash that littered the area where he'd been sitting.  
"As a result, life will be a bit… different for both of you. You'll have one heart, but you'll have six lives. COnsider them a present from the Master."  
Russell looked down at him, but the Doctor had already sped away. Even in a wheelchair, it was tough to keep up.  
"I kept one life for myself, I hope you don't mind. I'm going to need it, and the Master won't…not where I put him."  
Colleen shivered next to Russell's side, and there was something in the Doctor's voice then that even made Russell shudder a bit.  
"You're still human enough to have children, to raise a family… although it will be difficult to find where best to do it. You will… attract attention… and for that, I am sorry."  
Russell began to notice that the Doctor's breathing was a bit labored.  
"Doctor, are you all right?"  
The Doctor looked at him with a sad smile.  
"Of course not, my boy. But! There is still much to tell you. You see," he began wheeling to another side of the lab, where there appeared to be a door in the wall that went nowhere.  
"A Gallifreyan has a unique biological ace-in-the-hole: regeneration. When a Time Lord is near death, or otherwise… threatened, they can either enact or be subject to regneration. In one single… fiery instant, the entire… biology of the person is rewritten: new face, new person. A little different, but still… rather much the same. Some things go beyond the biological after all."  
He reached up and, with a bit of strain, flipped a switch. The doorway began to hum and fill completely with swirling blue light. The Doctor reversed (making sure not to crush anyone's toes) and wheeled a bit further down the wall, where a second doorway was. He reached up again for the switch, straining again, and Russell quickly reached over and flipped the switch for him. The Doctor gave him a look like a angry bulldog, and began wheeling back to the lab table.  
"And you're telling us this will happen six times?" Colleen asked.  
"Five, technically," the Doctor responded, pressing a few buttons on the table contraption, "six lives."  
"And will this… regeration happen to you, too?"  
He wheeled back to the first doorway, now glowing and swirling mysteriously. Once there, he noticed that Russell and Colleen hadn't followed. He angrily beckoned them over.  
"Come now. We haven't much time!"  
The two of them walked over, but seemed incredibly reluctant. The Doctor was not oblivious to this.  
"Oh, what's wrong with you two NOW?" he grunted.  
"What's going to happen to you, Doctor?" Colleen said softly, unable to hide her tears, "Will you… die?"  
"A coward dies a million deaths, my dear," he responded, holding her chin up with his index finger, "I however, will not technically 'die.' You see… I've done wrong. Very… very wrong. You two are supposed to be dead, by all the Laws of Time. You were not meant to exist right now. That means…"  
"The Reapers…" Russell said with quiet horror, remembering the days of Victorian Prime.  
"They will come for me," the Doctor continued, "as such, I will do what I did to my people, my planet… I will punish myself. I am exiling this body… with one life… into the Time Trap of Gallifrey. There, I will be safe from the Reapers, living my one life over and over again. To them, and to all of space and time, it will be as if I, as if we… never existed."  
"But how?" Colleen recoiled with fear.  
"The power generated by the Time Trap is more than enough, my dear, "It is enough to keep you both safe, it is enough to power the ship, and it is enough to keep me safe. It is enough…"  
"What will happen to the… other yous?"  
The Doctor looked down, sadly.  
"It will be as if I did not happen, Mr. Garamond."  
"Hey."  
The Doctor looked up to see Russell smiling through the tears. The gangly surgeon reached down with long, thin fingers.  
"That's Russell to you, pal."  
The Doctor took his hand and smiled.  
"Very well… Russell."  
"I won't forget."  
"I know you won't," the Doctor said, "the Time Trap won't let you."  
He wheeled over to a sobbing Colleen and beckoning for her to hug him. She did so, but her body was still wracked with sobs.  
"Dear me, Mr. Garamond… this woman is a mess!"  
Colleen laughed a little then in the middle of her sobs. She wasn't sure what to do.  
"Might I suggest," the Doctor continued, "a little vacation for the both of you? Perhaps, someday, you could meet me in a quiet little… black and white place?"  
Russell could suddenly hear the Rolling Stones parading through his thoughts again, and he smiled.  
"It's a deal."  
"But Doctor," Colleen whimpered, "What's to become of you?"  
"My dear, dear girl," he smiled, "I've spent far too long with… too many thoughts in my head. Once I remove myself from the timeline, the only thoughts I'll need to worry about… are my own. What's to become of me? I think, my dear Colleen… that I will think. Who knows…"  
He wheeled himself over to the second doorway.  
"Perhaps, given the… nature of time, I will be the old wise man on the mountain… I spoke with during my youth. Time will tell, after all… it always… does. Now now, we're… wasting valuable time. You've each got… five more lives, and I've… only got one left… we must move along. I do hope… you'll enjoy the little place I've picked out…for you…"  
Russell and Colleen looked into the swirling blue fog, which dissipated to show a lovely little farm house. Russell recognized it immediately.  
"That's my old house…"  
"You should find…" the Doctor's breathing was getting worse, "enough money… in your pockets to pay for… the house. Just in time…Russell… to buy it when your father has to…move away to the city…"  
"But…" Russell furrowed his brow, "Dad said he sold the house to some doctor…"  
He slapped a palm to his forehead and groaned.  
"I should've known."  
He turned back down to the Doctor and gave him a hug. The Doctor was very uncomfortable with it.  
"Thank you, Doctor. It's been… fun."  
"And you, Colleen?" the Doctor asked with one eyebrow up. Colleen did her best to smile.  
"Doctor," she said softly, "You've saved my life…twice… and you've introduced me to the man I love… yes, I'd say it was fun!"  
Each of them laughed, but it didn't last long. He shepherded them out of the doorway and they found, to their surprise, that they were standing on the lawn of Illinois farm land on one of those warm, but not too warm summer nights where the sweet wind blows the fragrance of alfalfa all around.  
"Good-bye, you two," the Time Lord said plainly, tears clearly present in his eyes.  
"Good-bye, Doctor," they responded. The Doctor turned to wheel back into his TARDIS, when Russell stopped him.  
"So, Doctor, you never told me," he said after a deep breath, "This 'regeneration' thing… is it going to happen to you?"  
The Doctor turned around and looked at Russell with the expression one might give to a curious kitten. The tears were still framing his clear, blue eyes.  
"My dear boy… It's already happening."  
And with that, he wheeled back into the TARDIS, which closed up and began to fly away into the night. Colleen and Russell watched as long as they could as the blue box floated away into the night, until a blinding golden flash from the windows of the ship made them turn their eyes away. When they could see again, it was just a calm and gentle Midwest night. Russell held his wife close to him, and together they both cried until they ran out of tears. After that, he took his wife from one hundred years ago into his new home, which was his old home, to live out the first of his six, long lives… all because of that Strange Man.

And when the golden flash receded inside the TARDIS, it was the old Doctor, the previous Doctor, thin and willowy with thick glasses and wild hair, sitting in the old study buried deep within the ship's interior. He was sitting in the same chair, with the same song playing on the phonograph, holding the little orange world in a bottle in one of his thin and dexterous hands. He stared at it intently, as if trying to remember something, turning it over and over in his hands, but always coming back to the mountains on the southernmost continent. He didn't even seem to blink until his companion, the one Dr. Martha Jones, entered the study. The Doctor, instead of turning around and smiling in that gawkish way he always had, was still fixated on the globe-like bottle. Martha approached him carefully.  
"Doctor?"  
He was still engrossed. She took a few steps closer.  
"Doctor?"  
The Doctor was jolted out of the melancholy and began being rather more like, well, himself.  
"Ah, Martha! Enjoy the zoo, then? Animals from all over the cosmos in there, even some that breath liquid nitrogen! I've often thought what it would be like to breathe liquid nitrogen, or breathe liquid at all, really…"  
"What were you looking at, over there?"  
She pointed to the bottle that the Doctor had set down in a polished cherrywood holder on one of the lacquered end tables. He started at it again, harder this time, as if trying to remember. Finally he shook his head.  
"Bah, must be nothing. Now! Martha Jones, where shall we go next? I never did get to the planet Barcelona, you know… they've got dogs with no noses, you can only imagine…"  
"I've heard the joke, Doctor."  
"Ah, very well then… say, have I ever told you about the Chameleon Arch?"  
And as they left the room, on those mountains on the planet inside the bottle, a small, bearded, legless man could be seen in a chair, looking out over the burnt orange skies of his homeworld, lost to space, lost to time, and lost in endless thought.


End file.
